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THE MILITANT February 15, 1929 February 15, 1929, THE MILITANT Page Page 25 to divert the new harmless channels. The uppercorne. with pseudo strikes.
in prowork of in the ity, fear of the twice as est organization The new are atof union and growth in The un anum relenting perialism in the Party he Party without been masses radicalization of the workers. On the contrary, labor bureaucrats of the of and the unaf influence of these groups at. present is weak, but it was one of the poorest. The indications of the filiated unions of the same type are the direct the growth of discontent of the workers and their radicalization process, which is bound to be accel bearers of this ideology in the working class and mood for struggle will give them the possibility erated in tempo in the coming period, are to be must be fought as such. The labor bureaucracy of the expanding it on a wide scale. The Com the daily economic life and strug is part of the capitalist rationalization and war munists must unmask them and make their decep gles of the workers of this country. They are to machine its labor wing. De Leon classic tion clear to the workers. Otherwise there is great be found in the movement for the formation of definition of the reactionary labor leaders as labor danger of them gaining the leadership of workers the new industrial unions, in the growing discon lieutenants of the capitalist class hol movements and strangling them.
tent of the workers even in the old of. good today. The distinctive features of these labor The main reservoir of labor militancy is the unions, and the growing mood for struggle that is leaders in comparison to the sociat reformist leadexemplified by the increasing participationers of Europe consists in the fact that they are masses of unskilled and semi skilled workers in outspoken defenders of the whole capitalist regime the unorganized, basie industries. The full horror of the capitalist rationalization falla directly upon Relative to the possibilities, the Communist and all of its institutions, without socialistic prethem, and the attacks of the capitalists in the Party made a poor showing in the elections, which tense or class struggle phraseology.
the basis of gram is a program of of stark reaction. They first and hardest. The Party must turn its face to these unorganized masses, put itself at the head the disfranchisement of foreign born workers and diate the class struggle in words as well as cepu present depression and coming crises strike them Negroes. In the 1924 elections the Party was on They oppose any kind of independent political of their struggles and lead in the work of organthe ballot in 14 states and received 33, 361 votes. action. They support the whole military program The vote for the Party in the same 14 states in of American imperialism and will indubitably be izing them into new industrial unions. This hisof strug.
the 1928 elections was only 31, 128, that is, a de powerful ally of the capitalists in lining up the toric task must be accomplished in the fire the capitalists and and their state power as received. 001146 of the total votes cast in 1924 struggle against it. They decline affiliation with the reactionary bureaueracy of the ador. more in, the 28, we received only. 000846 of the total vote the reformist Amsterdam International. They op Socialist Party and allied groups of social reformist cast in the country.
Thus we lost in those states pose even the mildest proposal for social legisla elements. In this protracted struggle on all fronts (the most important ones, too, like New York, tion and reform, and sharply differentiate them extending over a period of years the decisive break Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Illinois, Indiana, Mas selves from all of its advocates. The condemnasachusetts, Wisconsin, of the workers with the ideology of capitalism will etc. tion of the Brookwood Labor College at the fast absolutely, tionvention illustrates this attitude.
in number of votes received, and relatively to the be effected and the genuine class movement of the workers will be built.
total vote cast Our total vote in 1928 in all the This bureaucracy is the chief influence against 34 states where we were on the ballot was 45, 710, the class movement within the workers ranks an increase over 1924 not at all commensurate the strongest, the best organized and the repre Trade Union Policy with the fact that in this election we were on the sentative of the most reactionary program. The ballot in 20 additional states, that is, more than specific nature of the American labor bureaucracy correct policy on the trade union question and as many as in 1924. its present source of strength also makes it the its consistent execution by a sound Communist This alarming showing cannot be explained, more vulnerable in the period of growing radical leadership are decisive for the expansion of the ization. The very first steps of the workers to Party as the leader of the struggling masses. More La Follette sweep in 1924. It cannot be exover, the tactics of the Left Wing, lead by the plained by the terrorism of the bourgeoisie or direct struggle against them. The relentless and Party, a dynamic force of gigantic importance, will vote stealing that condition also existed in 1924. shrimp, based on a correct analysis of its specific role the future course and development of the trade In addition, it must be remembered that in the as the outspoken bearer of capitalist ideology, is a period between the two presidential elections, the as TH Party had more opportunities for growth, popular pregled The narrowing base of the of and the ity and influence than ever before. It led a of the workers, increasing their class un increasingly reactionary conduct and policy of its ber of the most significant strikes and mass move broader political aims.
derstanding and leading them to the fight for leadership raise before the Party and the Left ments: Passaic, the miners, New Bedford, the Wing the problem of organizing the unorganized Sacco Vanzetti agitation, and so forth and so on.
The indiscriminate lumping together of all the workers in the basic industries, primarily the un The real explanation for our failure in the fact various forms and methods of deluding the workers skilled and half skilled, who are becoming radicalthat the Stalinization here as else and holding back their class development, and theized and ready for struggle.
It is the task of the where, lias had terrific results.
has elements that represent them. capitalist welfare Party and the Left Wing to lead in the work of corrupted and weakened by factionalism and of program, La La Folletteism, liberal organizing new industrial opportunism, finding its chief source in ove churchmen, liberals and The center of gravity in our trades.
stone Pepper leadership supported by the Comin and Democratic Parties, bourgeois economists and unic union work belongs in this sphere. This has been indicated by the whole situation for some time and Party membership, factional distrust. irresponsibil current policy enunciated in the theses of the two the long delay of the Party in shaping its course factions, is profoundly erroneous. It glosses over in the class struggle in every instance. It is the the distinctive features specific role of each ship, has already had extremely harmful consegreatest obstacle in the crystallization and growth their relative importance at the moment and the and consequently makes impossible an estimate of the Communist movement in this country. the The history of the Party has been also the his There no other basic explanation for our par formulation of the most effective tactics of strug tory of continuous struggles for the correct line liamentary decline and can be no other.
gle against them in the trade union question. Isolation from the We deal here only with The Socialist Party has progressively degenerated masses and their struggles was the price paid by repetition of such points as the opportunist and expulsion of the Communist Left Wing the Party for its false trade union policy in its corrupt parliamentary methods of the Lovestonein 1919, and in in great labor struggles of recent earlier years. The trade union program adopted Pepper clique, the buying of signatures and elec years, particularly in the needle trades, became the in in 1920 which called for a boycott of the open ally of the employers and the of tors, the false conception of the Labor Party and of and support of the was only cor its role in the election, the failure to bureaucracy. It appealed for votes in the last rected after a stubborn and protracted struggle ness and speed in selecting our candidates and election campaign on the basis of petty bourgeois conducted by the main nucleus of the present Opputting our ticket into the field, the factionalism alism liberalism. The union struggles as well as the position. It was not until the Unity Convention rampant throughout the campaign, and so forth.
election campaign showed its influence to be in of June 1921 that a realistic program, steering the We have dealt extensively with these features of decline. In view of its tradition and its phraseo Party into the trade unions and outlining the plan the election in other documents, notably The logy, however, its potentialities as an influence for the formation of a broad Left Wing was finRight Danger in the American Party and articles against the class movement of the workers are very ally adopted. The entrance into the Party of a in the press.
The Communists must fight the Socialist number of experienced trade unionists was facilParty on all fronts in the most direct and irrecon itated by this decision in turn gave a great Struggle for a Class ciliable manner. correct estimate of its position impetus to its practical execution. Isolation gave and function is necessary for The Socialist a speedy penetration of of the Party into the Movement of the Party is not dead and its possibilities for a new trade union struggle, to the wide expansion of the growth in a period of growing radicalization of Trade Union Educational League as a bona fide the workers will be greatly strengthened by false movement of the Left Wing and to the appearance American Workers tactics of the Communists. The Socialist Party of the Party as an important factor in the Labor fights on on the side of imperialism against the wor Party movement.
The rich results of this policy adopted at the Due to the strong position of American capital keranin its own way, but it is wrong to describe it as an organic and indistinguishable part of the 1921 convention were in themselves an irrefutable ism, which has enabled it to bribe large sections of machine. It is true it will always form proof of its correctness. It was not executed, however, without one sidedness and distortions.
countries, the American workers, from a class difference in function and division of labor bestandard of living than that of the other capitalist movement for the into the latter hagainst any serious of the workers but there is an important In reacting against the basically false policy of the standpoint, are in a primitive stage of development. tween them.
1920 convention which called for the destruction The American workers are not class conscious, of the of the Party went to another ex The function of the of bureaucrats is treme and developed an of have riot yet developed even the concepts of they reformism or independent through and to stifle all progressive tendencies in the working Dual unionism became a bogey and practically la and, class and to defend capitalist institutions as they all independent unions and movements were on the whole, are. The function of the Socialist Party and of through with the ideology of capitalism These the related social reformists is to exploit these pro illustrates the great concessions to the labor beled as such. This very terminology graphically incontestable facts are the starting point of the gressive tendencies under more or less radical tions tionaries implicit in the one sided policy, for it Communist approach and indicate our fundamental phraseology and to divert them into hamless re their language. Dual unionism is their timetask: to struggle for the creation of a clase move formist channels which avoid a real collision either worn epithet for all revolting groups of militants.
mient of the American workers, for the develop with capitalism as such or the of bureau This fetishism blinded the Party to its tasks and ment of class consciousness, and to lead them to crats. The new campaign of the Socialist New duties in the unorganized fields and narrowed its ward revolutionary concepts in struggle. Leader against the Civic Federation policies of base of operations too much to the organized, more The fight for a class movement of the American Woll and the Progressive Manifesto of the La or less skilled workers. It was a factor in the deworkers is in the first place a fight against the bor Age group, are highly significant expressions lay of the Party shaping its course towards the cảpitalist ideology which dominates them. The of this specific role of these social reformists. The unorganized and shifting its center of gravity, there a course made imperative by the changing The attempt to classify the entire membership The chief danger to the progress of the Party circumstances.
of the of unions as aristocrats of labor, in its trade union work is the opportunist leader This shift of emphasis to the formation of new immune from class struggle agitation, which is im ship of the Party. Constantly oscillating between unions of the unorganized has been accepted in plied, and even partly stated, in the new theories, conservative passivity before the of and words after a long and stubborn struggle of the is likewise false. Deep currents of discontent, full adventurous plunges in the formation of new Opposition for this line. But the work has not of potentialities for futre struggles, already exist unions without adequate preparations in ad.
yet begun in earnest. The practice of the Party in the old unions and they will increase in the comvance, regarding the workers objects for man leadership in this field is marked more by sporadic ing period. The recent manifesto of the pseudo euvering rather than as class brothers in arms, spurts and spectacular stunts than by planful. sys progressive group tematic and deliberate work. Moreover, the turn a reflection of this discontent in the ranks of the ion, and permeating all the trade union work with of the emphasis to new unions of the unorganized, unions which the reformists seek into corrupt and poisonous factionalism, the Lovestonewhich ought to be indissolubly bound up in one of Pepper leadership has already proved itself ten comprehensive policy with the intensified work in movem movement, even in a times over to be a positive barrier in the path of the old unions is already being interpreted and of the Communists and the Left Wing who in re its head, is a sign of the abdication the Party and the Left Wing and a weight in the applied one sidedly.
scale against the proletariat. Its potentiatities for The in the old unions has been virtually cent years have led these movements. It is a harm in the impending struggles, with all their abandoned. This fact is clearly revealed in the al warning that continued neglect of the struggle in vast difficulties and possibilities, are enormous.
most complete disappearance of the Party repre.
the old unions clears the road for the reformist The Lovestone Pepper leadership rejected the sentatives from trade union gatherings. Still worse, stultification of potentially revolutionary move proposal of the Opposition in May 1927 to begin the leaders of the factions are competing with each ments within them.
preparations for the mobilization of the Left Wing other in the elaboration of theories which pre The Party must clarify its tactics on the trade in the United Mine Workers through a National clude the idea of serious work in the old unions in union question without delay. The organization Conference and followed a do nothing policy the future.
of the unorganized, into new unions, the foremost month after month while the strike was being cut The factions are outdoing each other in irresponsiand basic task, must go hand in hand with intensi to pieces by the Operators and the Lewis machine.
ble striving to be Left in this burning question. fied work in the old unions, including those which It was not until April 1928, after the strike was a These theories and practises are a menace to the exist alongside new unions, and a revival of the year old and had already spent its force, that a discarded united. front tactics.
Party and threaten to put it off the track again.
The Party must National Conference was finally held. It resisted of penetrate every movement and reIt is time to sound a warning and begin a de re the course toward a new miners union and did termined struggle against them. The building of volt against the bureaucracy, forming anisatic with all honest progressive workers, exposing the ized fields. Conservative unorgan the new unions and the work in the old unions particular oft and pseudo progressive leaders, and must be carried on together and not the one set passivity, deceptive and dangerous role labor fakers, lack of faith in the masses. Then up against the other.
into the calling of the strike in the The role of the An of leadership as the Sporting against them for the leadership of the in nized fields in April 1928 without the slightorganization. Adventurism and irin war preparations and in war does not a little struggle against the narrowing of the into In 1923 the present Opposition conducted a three million obliterate the fact It sabotaged and delayed the Twility proper affiliated unions. theories a purely Communist body with a Communist pro of internal Party factional considerations. It exgram and for broadening it into a united front of tempting to rationalize the out cluded and discriminated against the most qualified This was one of the most progres.
of organization.
and to arbitraunions and authoritative leaders of the miners movement rily preclude the possibility of sive struggles in the history of the Party. The reits future expansion vival of the Left Wing in the Miners Union and in an organizational sense.
in the formation of the leading bodies of the new struggle against the labor agents of im the subsequent leadership of the Party in a great unio union. It pushed aside real organizers of the wor miners mass movement were the result of the their role as a bulwark against the working class change in course brought about by this struggle faction agents. It reduced the Party Traction at of fiction and resistance to war is an obvious necessity. The insisted on in view of the departures that have decided all questions in advance through a small struggle against them for the organization and leadbeen made from it recently.
steering committee of the selected on a ership of the unorganized workers is the main aspect of the fight. But the matter does not end The which, thanks to false policies, faction basis and comprising a majority has degenerated into there.
a mere shadow of the Party expor authority in trade union work.
existing on paper, with little or no organization factionalism, callous disregard of the The workers organized in the of unions or life of its own, must be revived as a bona fide basic interests of the movement. The Lovestone have an enormous strategic importance. We must united front organization of the Party and nonfight the bureaucrats for influence over them from Party militants in the unions, the organizing center Pepper leadership lost interest in and virtually withdrew support from the new union at the most within, no matter how ardous the task, no matter of the new unions and the co ordinating medium critical time immediately after the convention. It how severe the and discrimination against us.
The abandonment of this struggle the old. The actual participation of influential financial help for the necessary organization work.
now taking place under cover of high sounding radicalism will only prevent the non Party workers in the activities of the of an insurgent movement within thystallization and in its leading committees is one of the absolut Even funds which properly belonged to this work were diverted.
prerequisites for this proper functioning of the given the opportunity to entrench itself again and free the hands of the bureaucrats for more on a genuine basis of broad organiza through lack of real competition from organizers effective sabotage of the organization of new And this holds a hundred fold of the new union. Dilletantism and irresponsi for these two processes are bound together. empi The net result will be to strengthen the effective emphasis in regard to the new unions which are bility.
ness of the of bureaucracy as a part of being formed. The leading role of the Party in the the new unions and in the Left Wing of The same methods have marked the course of old the Party leadership in other trade union fields.
unions is necessary for their development into The decline of the of in membership higher forms of struggle. But the construction of The formation of the new union in the needle and influence during recent years in an incontest the leading staff of these movements on a narrow trades was unduly delayed while opportunities able fact. But it represents a powerful force, Party basis with mechanical forms of Party control, were lost and the Right Wing advanced. Here a both in an organizational and ideological sense, above all mechanical faction control, which is the bloc of crass opportunists is maintained in leadon the side of reaction. And its further expansion growing practice under the present Party regime, ership while the Left Wing of genuine Communists in a period of growing mass struggles and serious are fatal to the growth and development of these is suppressed. In the textile industry a policy of work by the Left Wing in the building of new movements.
passivity before the old unions was followed by unions, particularly in the event of war, is by no In the work of forming new unions of the un the sudden formation of a national textile union means excluded. The assertions to the contrary, organized workers, no less than in its work in the prematurely, without sufficient preparation and of the Party must revive and apply the without an adequate base in local organizations.
Purjured up to support the new theories, are united front tactic. Maintaining always its inde These evil methods, repeated systematically, are obvious fact that the big employers under pendence and freedom of critcism, the Party must accumulating into a crushing weight upon the unions to the most conservative trade unions and manage programe and win the non Party militants greatest and the demands heaviest. They directly with us on a minimum classParty and the Left Wing, and leading to failure and collapse at the time when the possibilities are fight militantly to destroy the latter is not struggle of itself sufficient ground for such contention.
The whole rationalization process with its unbear joint struggle. An approach to threaten to discredit the idea of new unions, to demoralize the workers and destroy the prestige able and increasing exploitation drives the workers revolutionary syndicalist workers in the to revolt and to the endeavor to form of the Party for years to come. The Bolshevik izations. The coming period will see such strug The Party must strive to establish its decisive struggle to organize the workers cannot be sepainfluence and leadership in these united front gles on a large scale. Under such conditions rated from the struggle to reorganize the leadernot only possible but even probable that em struggles by its initiative, superior tactics and con ship of the Party on a proletarian Communist ployers, who reject the conservatiernative tor new replace the growing tendency toward exclusive unions under militant leadership and would even ness and mechanical, monopolistic Party control Ready Nowcollaborate with the bureaucrats in their formation, which only result in the narrowing down of the base new movements and organizations, in THE DRAFT PROGRAM OF THE the base for the building of new industrial unions nions their degeneration into impotent cliques, in their COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL of the unorganized workers as the main task of the isolation and defeat. Under the present conditions By TROTSKY Party. On the contrary it makes the energetic exe and relation of forces, the Party cannot put forth With an Introduction by James Cannon cution of this task all the more imperative. The the demand for arbitrary and mechanical control THIRTY FIVE CENTS PER COPY greater the progress the Party makes with this without endangering the developing movements 25 cents per Copy work, combining it with increased activity in the and blocking its own approach to the awakening Order now from THE MILITANT old unions, the stronger will be the barriers against non Party masses. The leadership of the ComBox 120, Madison Square Station the betrayals of the coming revolts by the of munists, which is alone able to steer the new moveNew York, machine.
ments on a correct course, must be won in struggle.
tern to of quences.
Omit the since the unions, with sure great.
this way to preplatform of over to the the course of spirit of basis.
fetishism.
reac In lots of o